2003-06-16 - 2:10 p.m.

On the internal soundtrack: "Blueberries"

OK, part of the reason I haven't been posting is the huge backlog of stuff, and part of it is that I hate resizing pictures, so I'm going to jump in and just post SOMETHING.

On Saturday I went to three grocery stores looking for "green chiles" and not finding them. So I did a lot of wandering around. I think I have to go to West Philadelphia if I want to find anything remotely ethnic. Anyway, while I was out:

I passed by a church and noticed for the first time that the churchyard (mostly gravestones) is open to the public and has benches in it. There are signs about it, and "please clean up after your dog" and such. I thought this was incredibly cool. They're very pretty, shady yards, and cemeteries are very restful anyway (HAW! Get it?!).

Two blocks down I passed another church (you can't spit without hitting a church or synagogue in Philly), and saw that it also was open to the public, and had a similar sign. Then I saw -- to my vast amusement -- a couple in their late teens, extremely pale, dressed all in black, hair dyed black, sitting on a bench and hugging and kissing. Walked a few more feet and saw ANOTHER couple on the ground behind a large gravestone doing the same thing. Cute little goths, making out in the graveyard. CRACKS ME UP.

So then I walk another block with a big grin on my face. I bet I scare people, walking around smiling at nothing all the time. They aren't in on the little joke.

The Republican candidate for mayor this year is named Katz. He was narrowly defeated in the last election, and everybody seems to hate Mayor Street, so he's running again. I passed a house with a sign that said "Democrats for Katz". People must REALLY hate Street if enough Democrats aren't voting for him that they're making signs.

There was a lost bird flying around in one of the stores. That was amusing too.

And finally, on the way home, I saw Spiderman. That time I laughed out loud. He was with the Incredible Hulk. They were both grown men on motorcycles. Spiderman was wearing a Spidey helmet, Spidey shirt, blue pants, red socks and shoes, and riding a motorcycle all painted like Spiderman. The Hulk was wearing a Hulk helmet and riding a Hulk motorcycle, and in retrospect he might've been wearing some Hulk clothes, but those are so plain that I didn't notice them. They were waving at kids on the street, so I, a 3-year-old at heart, waved and laughed some more.

Note to self: Never leaving the house without a camera again. Imagine if you could've taken a picture of the goths.

Side note: My parents did not know what a "goth" was when I related this story. Although when I described them, she knew the type.

Unrelated tangent: My mommy gave me some spider flowers and snapdragons from her yard!!! Yay!!!!! We'll see if they live. Will.Not.Get.Attached.

Yesterday morning in the Wawa, picking up milk and eggs, I was wearing the dress shown at the end of this entry. Kind of a slim-fitting (not tight) sundress, about 2 inches above the knee. I like to wear little dresses in the summer rather than shorts, but it's hard to find cotton dresses that aren't baggy, and the slimmer ones are always polyester. Ick. But I digress.

While perusing the donuts, I noticed a guy about 65 or so STARING at me from over by the coffee. As though he recognized me from somewhere, but he didn't look remotely familiar to me, so I didn't worry about it. He got behind me in line, chatted briefly with the girl behind him, and then said to me, "I'm glad some people still eat eggs." I said, "Yeah, sure, once in a while. I'm gonna do some baking with these."

Then he held the door open for me as I exited and this happened:

Evelynne: Thank you.
Strange Man: I'm trying to place your accent ...
Evelynne: [always amused by this question] I'm deaf.
Strange Man: Really? Wow, can you hear my voice?
Evelynne: A little. [explains lipreading thing]
Strange Man: Wow, how'bout that, so, would you like to have dinner with me?

[?!?!?!?!]

Evelynne: Thank you, but I'm married. Very sweet of you to ask, though.
Strange Man: Aw, what a shame. You're really beautiful. Your husband is a lucky man.

Happily I lost him at the restaurant on the corner, but that was something else. I'm always taken aback when men just jump right in and ask you on a date two seconds after meeting you. Freaky.

Then, of course, I came home to my shut-in and announced, "I just got asked out to dinner." "WHAT?!?!?!", he shouted. Really, if he doesn't want strange men asking me out maybe he should go places with me more often.

Anyway, Poindexter says it's a strategy -- if you ask every women who catches your fancy, eventually ONE of 'em's gonna say say yes at some point. I'd like to know whether this actually ever works. The thing is, it's usually weird desperate-seeming men who do it, so they've got a creepiness factor they have to overcome. Hm.

This is a snippet I wrote down awhile back and never posted:

So, I've been having an ongoing conversation about how you "know" when you meet the person who is "right" for you.

The short version, for me personally, is that I had a list of things I knew I wanted, based on friendships and past relationships. I knew what the "must haves" were and what the "I can put up withs" were. So when Poindexter came along, everything just fell into place.

My list was something like this, roughly in decreasing order of importance:

Open, honest, introspective (this is almost like a single quality in combination)
Happy
Loves life, takes joy in the little things
Financially responsible (this does not mean "rich")
Pragmatic
Libertarian/conservative politics

Last night while Poindexter was eating dinner, I "grilled" him. Notice how I have to get through his jokes before he'll actually answer the question.

Evelynne: How did you KNOW I was the right person for you?
Poindexter: I know everything. It came to me in a dream...
Evelynne: Haha, ok, seriously.
Poindexter: I knew some things ... daily sex, dishwashing, foraging...
Evelynne: Those were not on your list of criteria before you met me.
Poindexter: ...I have to put up with some things, like you making me go to parties, your dawdling...
Evelynne: I'm looking for the list of things you knew you wanted, not the putting-up-with list.
Poindexter: Okay. Um ... smart, appreciative of my sense of humor...
Evelynne: [snort]
Poindexter: Hey, I need an audience. Um ... sense of humor of her own ... ability to talk about anything ....
Evelynne: Did you learn you wanted those three things because [your most recent ex-girlfriend] didn't have them?
Poindexter: Yeah, pretty much. Um ... It's a bonus that you're inquisitive about the things I'd want to talk about.
Evelynne: Like what?
Poindexter: The things that people DON'T talk about. [Because it's difficult or embarrassing or whatever.] Happy ... boring ... can take a beating, perfect butt.
Evelynne: The perfect butt was that important?
Poindexter: Well YEAH!
Evelynne: You mean if I was exactly me in every other way but I didn't have the perfect butt, we wouldn't be together?
Poindexter: Well, I have to be attracted to you!
Evelynne: And the butt is THAT big a component in your attraction to me? [mentally thanking the Lord/fate/genetics for giving her this particular butt] Yeah, but I would still be attracted to you if, say, you had less spectacular eyes or if you were 30 pounds heavier.
Poindexter: I know you would. But I'm a GUY!

(OK, I'll just chalk that one up to the Mars/Venus thing. What attracts me to a man or turns me on is not about a specific body part. I worry a little whether he'll find me attractive "when my ass hits the back of my knees", as I like to say, to which he says, "Don't worry, we'll get you a butt lift," the bastard. Hopefully by the time my ass is in that position, he'll be too old to care.)

Anyway. I mentioned my own list to him, including "pragmatic", which I tried to explain as "somebody who can deal with life's ups and downs without getting all freaked out, who can deal with things and move on rather than getting hung up on them." He said, "That's kind of what I meant by 'boring' -- someone who can stay in and watch a movie and doesn't have tantrums."

He also mentioned wanting someone with her own identity and a sense of independence, someone who wasn't jealous and who trusted him. This is another one of those things he learned from a jealous, clingy ex that he had to break things off with. Those things are on my list, too, but I didn't think to enumerate it because it was such a basic requirement, I guess. I never had any identity/jealousy problems with Sam.

Gratuitous photo of the day was taken while the other in-laws were here. That's Poindexter's dad's (not Papa's) ear:

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